Menagerie of Lucifer
by MeykoLove
Summary: Annually prodigies compete in Valiant. A game, Zack learns, has no rules or regulations, where the fun is in spilling blood and the death of one is a step toward life for the others. Everyday inside the price mounts on his head. Eventual Yaoi, Zack/Cloud.


**Disclaimer: Final Fantasy VII, Kingdom Hearts and all affiliations are the property of Square Enix, and are used under the category of entertainment.**

**Menagerie of Lucifer**_** is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are the products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales or persons, living or dead is entirely coincidental, unless specified by the author. **_

**Menagerie of Lucifer**

**Prologue**

"_Because if you bury your nose deep and breathe through the life of a rose, through the flesh and the earth and the beauty, you smell the death inside." __**The Vour breathed deeply. **__"It doesn't think, not like humans, but it feels. It feels the end of its life looming almost as soon as it blossoms. And it fears. A rose's perfume is the terror of its own approaching death. I smell that on you tonight. Thick as blood."_

_-Simon Holt, The DeVouring_

Joie de Vivre.

Basically, I'm told, this phrase stands for the 'enjoyment of life'. Partaking in and appreciating the breathing of air, the flitters of thought, the twitching of nerves.

To desire to walk and be able to move forward. To dig your heels into whatever ground beneath just to test its solidarity. To love and like your own existence, and do whatever you please.

Why? Just because.

Just because it will confirm you are still alive.

Moreover, if you're alive you have a chance to be happy.

And if you're happy, then you're obviously enjoying life, right?

You'd be living the phrase.

Walking down that dimly lit hallway, with those choking walls of dismal grey, I didn't think about much. More like anything at all. Not that anybody can actually focus with such high-strung nerves, dilated eyes, and a heart beat drumming like the countdown of their life. Every step set off a thump like the timer of a ticker-bomb, and beyond imagining this would be the last time I would taste worldly air, I didn't think.

_Ten_

_Nine _

_Eight_

Not then, as the lights blinked out and I was left in darkness and ambivalence, considering the option of continuing forward or dashing back to the door and pounding on the heavy mellifluous surface in hopes someone would free me. Free me of sacrificing something every human being had a right to.

_Seven_

_Six_

_Five_

Finding the reasons behind this game was as easy as finding the corner of a circle. Conclusion? It's impossible. Just as the shape, this game had no point for persistence or being such an integral part of everybody's lives. Maybe it just had so many points they all blended into one smooth, round edge. It doesn't matter. No amount of profit, or entertainment, or fun could sanction the death and mauling of innocent life. So no matter how many points that circle runs through, none of them could possibly make this right.

_Four_

_Three_

_Two_

This_. _The murdering of my own chances. My chances at reaching and cradling that one special phrase, that single attainment. _Joie de Vivre. _The enjoyment of life. Something I couldn't have if I wasn't alive.

_One._

**Author's Note: I bet everyone reading this (if there is anyone) is like; wuuuuuuut? I dun get! Which is perfectly okay, cuz it's not exactly...understandable? But you got that someone's walking down a hallway, right? Right? Gosh, this chapter sounds so melodramatic. SOB! I'm wondering if I can even do the kind of humour needed for Zack's happy, optimistic attitude. Cross those fingers!**

**So, this story is gonna be a huge combination of ideas, but with a little Meyko spunk thrown in. I've got t'say right off the bat that the idea has inspiration from **_**The Hunger Games, Pendragon, Tsubasa RESERVoir CHRoNiCLE, Incarceron **_**and Kingdom Hearts, and some others I can't quite recall at this time. Which are all obviously not owned by me. The idea that people are forcibly entered into a game of life and death is not original. MOL (wow, what a weird abbreviation) will draw heavily on the concept of different classes of people set against each other within a game, and the idea will be to survive, so it will seem exceedingly similar to **_**The Hunger Games. **_

**But there are differences that make it my own, so I won't just be changing the storyline of anyone's story and subbing in my own characters. I'll be upset if anyone says that. Please, if you like it, leave a review, if you have some constructive criticism, leave a review, but don't just bash me to have fun. I'll actually laugh at you if you do cuz I have friends that just go around making people angry for fun, and I think it's really lame. Seriously, don't boast about having no life.**

**Well, I think my author's note and disclamation successfully outnumber my actual story on the word count. So I best be gone!**


End file.
